When looking at the politics of the American right and the American left, there is no contest for me as to which to support, if these are my only options.

I see the right doing hateful, authoritarian things that seem to violate their own principles. They violate their religious principles as a largely Christian group who say they want to emulate Jesus but then seem to do the exact opposite at every turn. WWJD seems to be about counterexamples. Non-religious principles are also violated, such as personal liberty, small government, and upholding the constitution (all of it), while trying to force their will on everyone else. Republicans are currently pushing us into a dictatorship, thwarting the balance of powers that were set up by colluding across government branches to dismantle the country, and really seeming to be going against everything our constitution is about, cackling in our face the whole time, right out in the open. Most recently this was about the white house openly declaring they wanted to be able to “deport” (sic) citizens to prisons in other countries (source: https://bsky.app/profile/onestpress.bsky.social/post/3lmd2n77ko22g). I am for personal freedom, liberty, small government, and the values of the Constitution. If Republicans stood for what they claim to, I might very well vote Republican, and do so proudly. These people just have a way of twisting these values to be about serving them only, at the cost of others losing these same things, and more.

I see the left (Democrats) trying to do a little bit of good, although they are largely pro corporation (vs the individual), and also support / do shady things militarily to other countries. It isn’t lost on me that the DMCA was signed into law by Bill Clinton which calls for search and seizure without a warrant, or that the over-response to 9/11 hasn’t been curbed at any of the possible points with democrats in power.

There is a lesser of two evils here that I see, and that is Democrats – and it isn’t even close. They aren’t perfect, but they aren’t actively, overtly, trying to do evil and destroy our country. I don’t see any realistic alternatives either.

However, there is a belief that the Democrats did everything they could do to stop Trump and all of this from happening and that other things are to blame – like perhaps not enough voters turned out, and so it’s the fault of the voters.

No matter what the reason is for the loss, for us to consider the Democrats blameless in the current state of affairs is to accept a useless medical diagnosis for the country. It essentially says that we did everything we could, we still lost, and there is no way to win. Where does that leave us other than giving up? What’s the next step besides smugly watching the world burn and saying “I told you so”? Hopelessness is a terminal diagnosis without a treatment plan.

Consider the CEO of a failing company blaming the customers for not buying the product, or the employees for not performing well enough. Even if these things are true, it’s within the CEO’s responsibility to make the company succeed as well as possible, under any circumstances. Just because a failure can be explained doesn’t excuse the responsibility of failure.

Similarly, the democratic leaders we trusted to help preserve our country have failed. They may have failed despite their best efforts, but they still failed.

Consider this: If the Republican misinformation machine of Fox News et al. can mobilize and motivate people into action, why can’t the Democrats?

I’d like to see a stronger party more about individual empowerment, tougher on corporations and their monetary influence in politics, breaking up actual monopolies, and with the energy and cunning to fight literal evil and a stronger conscience to actually do what is right.

Winning is possible, but the Democratic party opposing the Republicans is not up to the task. So the question becomes: What do we do now? I’m not sure, but I’m not giving up, and I hope you aren’t giving up, either. Let’s keep our eyes open and do what we can, even if only small acts of kindness to foster the world we want, until larger ideas come into view that we can all get behind.

If you have other ideas, speak up. We need a bit of a country wide brainstorming session right now to figure out how to attempt to fix this mess.